Princeton women get date with Florida State, Baylor awaits winner

Players on the Princeton women's basketball team at Triumph Brewing Company react to the announcement on ESPN to their destination in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. From left, Nicole Hung, Megan Bowen, Kate Miller, Niveen Rasheed and Lauren Polansky.Keith A. Muccilli/ For The Times

That’s who the Princeton University women’s basketball team will face if it wins its first-round NCAA Tournament game this weekend.

The Tigers, seeded ninth in the Oklahoma City regional, will face No. 8 seed Florida State at 5:10 p.m. Sunday in a game televised on ESPN2.

The Seminoles have gone 22-9 overall and 11-7 in the Atlantic Coast Conference this season.

Princeton, 22-6 and winner of the Ivy League for the fourth straight season, will be looking for its first-ever NCAA Tournament victory, having lost to St. John’s, Georgetown and Kansas State the past three years.

As the team and coach Courtney Banghart watched the pairings unfold on a large screen upstairs at the Triumph Brewing Company, they had to wait for the final regional to hear their destination.

Expected to be an eighth or ninth seed by some experts, their fate became pretty apparent right before the 8-9 pairing flashed on the screen.

Banghart nervously wrung her hands as she stood behind her team, and the room erupted in cheers when Princeton’s name appeared.

Obviously the mission is to win the program’s first NCAA game, but at least initially the prospect of facing No. 1 Baylor dominated everyone’s minds.

Senior co-captain Lauren Polansky was clear about not looking past FSU, but she admitted it “would definitely be very exciting to actually play Griner and the rest of the team that’s had so much media attention.”

Banghart of course steered her comments to the opening game with Florida State but offered a positive in the matchup.

“We’ve been the hunted all year and that target has been getting heavy, and now we get to do a little hunting for our own. The change of roles for our team is exciting,” she said.

No one knew anything about the Seminoles other than they’re located in Tallahassee, Fla. Probably the same could be said about FSU’s knowledge of the Ivy League team.But don’t expect the No. 8-seeded Seminoles to take the No. 9 Tigers lightly.

“I think the kids have done too well for too many years now, and we’re not gonna creep up on anybody,” Banghart said.

The Tigers lost by only three points to Kansas State last March, a loss Banghart said definitely impacted the returning players.

Especially the current seniors.

“I think the athletic mortality of the seniors can’t be overstated; the fact that it’s win or go home,” Banghart said.

“And I hope I can manage that well with them. Other than that, the beauty of this age is they don’t connect the dots very well.”

What the seniors do know is that just getting to the tournament is no longer enough. It is not the end goal.